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May 22 Last PostcardI smell like I've walked through the perfume section of a department store, from all of the hugs and kisses today. The goodbyes have been tempered by promises of visits to Canada and Mexico. I'm almost packed, but can't say that I'm ready to let go.
I have lived the most beautiful, authentic, and unique life that I could choose for my self up to this point. I have embrased being an artist, a language learner, a happy spirit, a wanderer, a thinker, and a leader. I grew the most by being a follower though. I would do all of it a million times over, without changing a thing- I always wondered if I would feel that way at the end of my journey.
I've proved that I'm not afraid of change and I'm not afraid of me. I only added, never lost.
VIVA MEXICO! Thank you. I love you.
May 20 Adios AmigosThe word adios doesn't come up often in my conversations in Spanish, because it signifies saying goodbye to somebody for a long time. Normally, we say hasta luego, or, see you later. Sadly, the time has come to start saying adios.
I've said adios over lunches, parties, coffee, and walks. Over jazz, reggaeton, and mariachi music. I've been talking and laughing and crying so much that I've lost my voice as a result. The voice is overrated though, when one can have a bear hug with another.
In general, the surrealness of my life has multiplied the past two weeks. An on-again off-again flame decided that he loved me, and another man reminded me that his marriage proposal was still open. Three of my friends hooked up with three of my other friends in one night. I've seen who will just be passing through my life, and who will be there to stay.
Last night we went to party at my favourite club, Gendarmeria, in Polanco. It was the perfect venue, the place where everything began, where I met my favourite people and sang at the top of my lungs with the band. This last time I was arm in arm with all of my friends on the dance floor. There was a song about saying goodbye, and everybody was pointing at me, smiling and singing along. I was a wreck! It seemed the only thing to do was dance as much as possible, until the crowd thinned out, until my feet blistered and until my mouth was dry. My Mexican sister Monsey brought me home and stayed over. Both of us fell asleep until we heard the explosion of fireworks being set off down my street.
Despite waking up bone tired, I remind myself that this isn't really the time to sleep, I can do that in Canada.
May 13 The Honest LawyerWhile waiting for my bus, I looked at some music at the pirated CD stand. The young guy working at the stand told me that he thought I had moved somewhere else. No, I replied, I´ve just been busy. We conversed a bit more, and he revealed that he was a law student at UNAM, the prestigious public university.
¨So¨, I said, ¨you´re studying law and selling illegal material?¨
He glanced up, surprised. ¨Yeah, you know how it is¨.
¨But don´t you have to have some morals?¨, I promted. ¨I don´t think I would want you to be my lawyer!¨
He laughed... ¨girl, things are different here!¨
At least he was honest about that. May 12 If I Were to Run to the Border| have been fixated on what it will be like for me to leave Mexico, but of course, there are fabulous things to look forward to at home.
#1. I miss my family. Living in a culture where family is the centre of everything makes living alone pretty sad sometimes.
#2. I miss really intellectual conversations. Most of this need stems from conversing in my intermediate level of Spanish.
#3 I also look forward to sharing some particiular liberal ideals with a mass of people, including environmentalism, social justice, and feminism. I crave a recycling system. I miss people who believe that everybody is equal, no matter their race or income. The system isn´t perfect, but it exists.
#4. I salivate for international cuisine, finding food from Mexico, India, Thailand, France... I also look forward to being able to afford these culinary luxuries, because in Mexico they can burn holes in your pockets and wallets.
#5. I will enjoy reasonable phone and internet rates, but miss a more interactive community around me.
#6. The thing to look foward to the most in Canada is the understanding, tolerance and encouragement to continue living this bicultural life. May 11 Power Off, Brain OnWe´ve had daily power outages in my neighbourhood, from ten to twenty minutes at a time. Sitting in the dark has given my brain even more time to reflect, it´s almost in overdrive.
I was ready to leave Brazil after a year, the place wore me out. Leaving Italy wasn´t hard, I didn´t really attach myself and found the people could be rude to foreigners. And Mexico? It pulls at my heart, equally with Canada. I´ve stopped sleeping at night.
When I think about what I will bring back with me from this time in my life, it won´t take up very much space in my suitcase. I don´t want to pack the pottery, Mezcal, paintings, or silver. I will have some photos and mementos, but the thing I will hold closest is the memories of friendship, the richness of the language, and the new way of seeing the world.
I can tell you without hesitation how I´ve changed for the better. I´m more outgoing and friendly with people I´ve just met. I am more patient with the things that I know I can´t easily change. I live more for the moment, because the future is so unpredictable. I´ve continued to work hard (too hard), but I´ve also learned to really make use of my spare time, rather than let it just pass by. I´ve learned to get the dreaded ¨serious Canadian look¨ off of my face, and you wouldn´t believe how much more approachable that´s made me. I´ve convinced myself to be much more adventurous and spontaneous, but still use caution and follow my instincts, I really like the balance that I found in this regard.
I don´t understand everything yet. Participating in three hour meetings at work is still torture. I just want yes to consistently mean yees. And why can I find three sizes of plastic spoons, but no knives, anywhere?
In the end, the good far outweights the bad, because I´ve stayed true to myself. I´ve changed but haven´t given up a bit of my authentic self. If I could package the value of that, it would fill the plane. NewsThis week, the attack of another Canadian hit the northern news. The police say he fell off a balcony, the family says he was assulted. It´s hard to speculate. I side with the Canadians with the fact that I don´t trust the police (the chief in the balcony incident is being investigated for narco connections himself) but I´m so tired of hysterics in the news. You´ve read this rant from me before.
One thing I couldn´t help noticing in all of the stories that I´ve read is the presence of alcohol. Being drunk in public here is a big no no, an embarrssment... and yet I´ve seen so many foreigners stumbling around the cities behaving stupidly. You do have to take basic precautions here, and you can´t do that while oozing booze.
The rest of this weeks news is pretty standard. A mere 10 000 Mexicans got naked in the Zocalo of Mexico City on Sunday morning. Naked protests are popular in this modest city, but this was for a Spencer Tunick photo shoot. Some very revealing (but tasetful) photos are located here: http://fotos.eluniversal.com.mx/fotogaleria/wfg.html?gal=3559.
Meanwhile, the narcos continued to attack each other (they are dangerous), Mexico City legalized first trimester abortions, and the pope said that the lawmakers who passed this should be excommunicated (a comment later edited by the Vatican to sound tamer).
In some ways it´s just another week, an in another, it´s amazing to see how much this country changes month by month. May 06 Wedding CrashersTen hours of sleep the night before? Check. Comfortable sandals? Check. Formal dress dry-cleaned and ready to wear? Check. Date? Check. I was ready for Gaby's wedding.
I was floating in dream land, when the distinctive ring of my phone alerted me that I had recieved a text message. The screen lit up, letting me know that it was 5:40 in the morning, and that my date was going to miss the first bit of the wedding. I hastily wrote back "Alex, I don't believe it! Fine." and annoyed, tried to go back to bed. When I woke up I remembered that the wedding was out of town, and I had little time to find an alternate way to get there. After many phone calls to friends (who were sleeping and didn't answer), I ended up running to the house of a colleague and yellwed her name for 10 minutes until she came to the door and agreed that of course I could go with her.
The wedding was at a well known chapel in Tepozotlan, almost an hour from the city. After a beautiful service, we went to a sunny garden and were served delicious traditional Mexican food and fruit dipped in chocolate. The conservative style of the wedding surprised me, because Gaby is always very chic and Urban.
Weddings here always seem to require that you have a date, and it took me a while to realize why, but I think it has something to do with the fact that so many of the dances here require a partner. Fortunetly, Alex showed up just in time, and he's a fabulous dancer. Since I just learned how to dance two weeks ago, I wanted to dance to EVERYTHING, and the poor guy eventually made us sit down and have a tequila. I jokingly reminded him that I had gone to see him at the Nike 10k race, but let up until he had recharged.
Gaby's wedding started at 12:30 in the afternoon, and was still going strong at 10pm. However, Alex had a friend who was also, coincidently, getting married in Tepozotlan, and he wanted to go and meet up there. We didn't have an invitation, but I figured if Oprah could crash weddings, I could too.
It was strange to attend another wedding, which looked completely different, but had similar people dancing in similar dresses to the same songs that we had danced to for 8 hours before.
As I was dancing, a booming voice came up behind me, shouting, "Guerita!". I whirled around, and started into the chest of my friend Red. It was wild, because Red and I been trying to make plans the day before, until we realized that we both had weddings to attend.
I had a number of guys who were happy to dance with me at wedding number two, and we stayed until the lights amazingly flickered on and the wedding was called to a close at 2:30am. What surprised me more than the early closing was my energy level- I could have gone on for another fourteen hours. May 04 Free to a Good Home?The person who said they wanted to take care of Xempa apparently played the "yes means no" game with me, because the past three times they were supposed to pick her up, they didn't.
There isn't a lot of time left, so I thought I would post an add for her on Craigslist Mexico City, until I read this...
It's worse than my friend's offers to turn her into a tasty stew!
May 01 ¡Ay, como me duele!Preparing to leave a country is almost as hard as preparing to get there in the first place, with all of the paperwork, packing, organizing... what nobody really talks about is the heart ache. I feel like I´m going through a really slow break up. I wish that none of it was so complicated- family and money vs. colour, history, and surrealism.
Last night, somebody said to me, ¨In developed countries, you can live comfortably. In Mexico, you can be happy¨.
So I´m trying to balance all of these feelings on my past, present, and future. There have been days where I refuse to think about any of it, completely avoid reflecting on anything that I see, knowing it will just depress me. There are other days where I feel a desperation to make as many of my visions stay in my head as possible, whispering to myself that I will never forget what I experience. There have been days where I want to try everything that I see (and subsequently don´t fit nicely into my jeans), and others where I don´t feel like eating anything, and shrink back to size. It´s been stressful. Really stressful with work on top of that.
Top these mind wars with the constant voices of, ¨Sami! No te vayas¨, ¨Sami, don´t go¨. There are so many beautiful, fun people here that I love, and that love me in return. The friends I´ve made here are one of the things that I´ve come to value most. It hurts me more to say goodbye to them than the people at home, because I don´t know when I´ll see these ones again, where the people at home were always sort of a given.
Currently, I´ve rebelled agaist the local tendency of trying to have as many goodbye parties as possible. I want life to continue like normal, with normal parties and normal dinners, until my last weekend. Otherwise, there are just too many tears that well up in my eyes.
April 23 Little Miss CanadaAs you can see from my lack of posting, I've been busy. Completely exhausted is a better description. I'm a workaholic who has been on a marathon.
So what was my solution to avoiding burnout? Working even more on the weekend, so that I would feel justified to go to a party on Saturday night.
Alex called me last Wednesday to invite me to a costume party downtown Mexico City. I said sure, almost backed out two times, and then reminded myself that I had to get my fill of cultural experiences before I leave. I couldn't decide what to go as and refused to spend money on a costume, so I left it until the last minute, letting my creativity take over fifteen minutes before being picked up. I threw on my black dress, tuned my Olympic scarf into a sash, cut out a yellow foam crown, dug out my only tube of lipstick, and poof, I transformed myself into Miss Canada.
The fiesta was a blast, because it was a closed off street, where every house was participating. As you can see in a few of the pics, everybody took their duty to dress pretty seriously, with most renting elaborate getups.
I got an invitation to dance, and before accepting, gave my usual advance apology of having the grace of a buffalo. As we started though, it clicked, and I felt like I was floating.
My partner looked at my quizzically and said, "you dance just fine".
No saying this through a grimace, no howling in pain, no suddenly having to run off and find his cousin. We finished and I got an invitation to dance with somebody else, in a different style. Again the advance apologies, and again, I nailed it. Then another dance... salsa, cumbia, banda... was it the glamourous scarf draped over my arm? The majestic foam tiara? Whoops, don't question the new found powers. I danced all night, ojnly realizing that it was time to go home when the sun was shining in my face. April 18 Yeah yeah...My friend Gary made a point of writing to remind me that I haven´t written here lately. Yeah yeah, I know... those who think that Mexico is laid back haven´t actually worked here. I´m swamped. Plus, I´ve gotten a personal trainer at the gym, and have tried to see some friends before I go... hopefully I´ll add something substancial on the weekend, because besides being a workaholic robot, I always find something fun to do. April 08 The People You Meet Along the WayA lot of the joys that I received from avoiding tourists is that I feel I got a more authentic and interesting experience in general. Of course, it´s also not just where you go, but the people you meet. Here is a summary of some of the most interesting characters up to arriving in Comitán.
Saying GoodbyeOn Tuesday morning, David, our new friends from the Czech Republic and I, realized that we had to say goodbye to Miramar and continue on with the rest of our adventures. The thought of getting back on the horse truck didn´t particulary appeal to any of us, so we inquired about another method of transportation. In David´s words- if I hear ¨BAG¨ once more...! One option was a plane, which would have been $200 to split between us, or a boat, $70 to split. We settled on the boat, which was nice, except after having sat on trucks, horses, and canoes for three days, I had really bruised my backside and wished I could take this leg standing up.
An hour and a quarter later, the boat guide dropped us on the lush banks of a hill. We climbed up, and found to our surprise that we were not in civilization as we had planned, but on yet another dirt road with shacks and livestock. Furthermore, it started to rain hard. A man came and met us on the road, leading us to his house so that we could take refuge. It was actually lovely, sitting amongst the turkeys and a baby pig that liked to have its tummy scratched.
Two hours later, a combi (a public transit van) came by our section of the road, and we climbed in, travelling for another three hours to get to the city of Comitán, which hadn´t even been on my itinerary.
We hit a military check point, and were asked to get out of the van. The group and I were surrounded by soldiers with machine guns as they searched our bags for weapons and drugs. Satisfied that we weren´t criminals, we were allowed to return to the van and continue the adventure. Time WarpOne blaring observation about these remote villages in Chiapas is their different perspective on time from the rest of Mexico.
First, they did not follow the time change that the rest of Mexico switched to last Sunday. A worker at my hotel put it this way: there is the government´s time, and God´s time. We follow God´s time.
Second, they must feel that God is an early bird, because everything was done in a very timely manner! We left to go to the jungle early, and every time we made arrangements for a guide or service, the people showed up at least an hour before being scheduled. My theory is that with natural light and screeching birds as an alarm clock, there was nothing else to do but get up and get on with the day. Laguna Miramar, The LakeThe President got right down to business and took us to where we could stay. It seemed he liked us and our reasons for arriving on his doorstep. As we slowly walked along dirt paths, every person that we passed looked at us and politely greeted us with ¨Buenas Tardes¨. Actually, that´s understating it. Old men stopped their horses, women poked their heads out their doors, and children came right up to us to unabashedly gawk at us. I tried to be subtle about looking at people and their customs, but they didn´t take their eyes off of me.
We stopped at a series of bright yellow cabañas. The dwellings were immaculately clean inside, with a single electric bulb attached to the roof, a small porch, and a bathroom across the path. We could stay there for $10 a night, or sleep in hammocks underneath a palapa (open structure with a roof). We chose the cabañas for that night, hammocks for the next night, arranged a guide, a canoe, and then paid up.
I said goodnight to the scorpion in the bathroom, buenas noches to all of the moths in my room (they were attracted to that blissful light bulb) and fell into a deep sleep at 8pm...
My body behaved in the most annoying way, daring to wake up at 6 o´clock in the morning. Our guide wasn´t scheduled to come until 8. I got up anyway, bathed in the river (there was no running water) and found that David had also woken up early. This was convenient, because our guide set his own timeline and was waiting for us at 6:45.
We had asked the locals what it was like to take the 7km hike to the lake, and they said it would be great. David asked if it was difficult, and I elaborated, asking if the walk was flat or hilly. Oh no, they said, it´s fast and pretty flat.
The moral of that story is that you should not ask people who have lived in a jungle all of their lives, if a hike will be easy or difficult. We didn´t have to cut a path with a machete, which would make it easy, but on a scale of 1-10, I would rate the trail at a 7, and I jog a fair amount.
The most surprising part of that hike was running into men from another village who were returning from the lake. They had a band of cloth cutting across their foreheads, which was attached to something black and boxy on their backs. They were dragging these boxes up an extremely steep hill. Where they coffins? No, they were speakers and subwoofers from their party the night before.
When we arrived to the lake, I was in awe, and from the pictures I posted you can see why. The canoe was waiting for us, and our guide slowly cut his paddle through the crystal clear water. The guide tried to teach me some words in the Chol dialect, but even the simplest words were too complicated for me.
We went to visit a cave full of bats in the ceiling and giant tortoises under the water. We came to ancient Mayan petraglyphs of a hand and jaguar, saw a Mayan rock carving, and hiked to a bay full of crocodiles.
I asked our guide why the crocodiles came to this section and not the main lake.
¨Oh¨, he replied, ¨there are crocodiles in the main lake too.¨
¨And you let me swim in there?¨ I squeaked.
¨Nah, it was ok, they like it there more in the night¨.
One of the things I wanted to do the most, which was visit the island with the ruins, was not possible, because the neighbouring village was in charge of that area and had closed it to tourists.
I was prepared to see a lot of wildlife, but it turns out that the savage animals were going to bed at 8am. I could hear the howler monkeys (like lions) and saw a lot of fish, birds, and crocs. The only mammal that I saw was a poor little spider monkey, dead on the jungle floor.
The day was deliriously beautiful, and it had been worth traveling almost 8 hours to get to see the area. Some of the village leaders told David and I that when they were making council decisions, they had to think hard about what kind of legacy they wanted to leave for their children, and then decided to get advice on a 100% protection and anti-pollution policy, along with a real eco-tourism project. It seems that the most poor, simple people on our planet can have the wisest visions on how we need to take care of our earth. April 05 Laguna Miramar, The JourneyOn Saturday night, I was relaxing at my hotel in the pretty little city of Ocosingo. As I was walking past the foyer, I heard a voice speaking Spanish with an American accent, talking about going into the jungle. Curious, I wandered over and joined the conversation. The voice belonged to David, a 45 year old elementary teacher in Mexico City, and he was going to the very remote Laguna/Lagoon of Miramar. I had done a lot of research about this trip about two years ago, but didn`t think it would be possible to do by myself. The idea now bounced wildly around my brain, and I felt that even though I had no idea what I was doing, and would be cancelling my previous plans, that I would just get my things together and do it. We planned to leave at 8am the next morning.
When we got to the transportation area the following day, we were direcoted to a truck, which is a loose interpretation, because what we found was a cross between a modified horse carriage and a giant grocery crate with wheels. The groceries received first priority, and then women and children, for seats. I sat down on a wooden plank, while the men stood or perched themselves on a metal frame. I wedged my body between a crate of avocados and an indigenous woman and her 3 year old daughter. The young girl threw up as soon as we hit the rougher road, and her mother kept yelling at the dozing men, ¨bag... BAG!¨.
The pavement turned to dirt, and we weaved around the side of mountains, sometimes tipping precariously or slowing to a crawl where the road had fallen off the side of a cliff. I didn`t look.
We dipped into valleys, avoiding all of the livestock that had congregated on the sides. At first the trip seemed wild, savage and romantic. Then it almost seemed boring (after hour 5), and after the 6th hour, I was becoming a little desperate to get off the truck and into the village, any village.
As we passed the tiny hamlets, I realized that no particular stereotype could be made. Some places were so poor that the houses were made of old wooden planks and loosely thatched roofs, with no running water or electricity. Some places announced that they had one public phone. Throughout, many women wore traditional costumes, bright and immaculately clean. I saw that they wore these not for tourism, but for themselves. The final observation? Coca Cola can be found on the most remote parts of earth.
Rambling inside of the truck for 6.5 hours, we got to know a little more about our companions. Most were from Ocosingo and were going to visit family in the jungle town of San Quentin, which David and I called the Metropolis of the Jungle, due to the fact that it had a well formed road.
We arrived to San Quentin and gently lowered our weary bodies from the truck. We walked past a military base and down a long dirt road, until we got to the village of Emilio Zapata (named after the hero). We asked for the President of Tourism, and were directed to the last house on the road. He was there and warmly led us into the village, promising that we were welcome and would love the Laguna Miramar...
March 31 Curious GeorgeI am in Chiapas! It´s a good thing I started running again this week, it was enough preparation to RUN to the boarding gate at the airport (Mexicana Airlines has nice planes but horrible service!).
I had a little itirnerary of things to do up to Wednesday, before going to San Cristobal, but this is now going down the drain in order to go on an adventure I had been thinking about for two years, but didn´t see the possibility in. I´ve found an elementary school teacher who is going, and decided to hop on board.
We will leave the town of Ocosingo at 9 in the morning, and get on a truck that will take us 130 kms west, to a lake called Miramar, deep in the jungle of Lacandona. The ride will take about 7 hours because of the roads. When we get there, we will have to ask the village leader for permission to stay there, must guarantee that we will rent a guide, and will hopefully stay with Mayan families as boarders. The lake is pristine, no boats allowed, no pollution, almost no civilization. It´s full of alligators, howler monkeys, and has an island with Mayan ruins that you have to canoe to.
I´ve never been so excited to leave civilization! Updates and photos will follow on Tuesday- if we get permission to stay, and avoid becoming gourmet reptilian food ;)
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March 27 Goodbye, Easter BunnyEven though I have just under two months left, I´m already forced to say goodbye to a very special friend, Xempita. Apparently rabbits don´t enjoy plane rides (they can easily have heart attacks) and I am giving her away this week, so that she can adjust to her new home before I leave.
Considering her general lack of personality at the beginning of our relationship, I´m surprised how depressed I´ve gotten over the idea of giving her up, and how much I´m going to miss her. I wrote out a giant guide for her next owner, and realized how much spirit she has- little flips when she´s happy, sleeping with her eyes open, nibbling on my favourite shoes when she´s playful... sigh. I´ve doted a lot of attention on that ball of fur, and can only hope that she will continue to be this spoiled.
Te amo mi gatonejo What Will They Lock Up Next?I´m trying to check the final details off of my Chiapas trip list. One of my to-do´s was purchase a small lock, so I headed over to the supermarket.
I had a general idea of where they would be located, and when I arrived to the spot, I saw that the locks were locked behind a glass cupboard. If I wanted to pick up an air rifle, that would not be a problem, I would just go to the sporting goods... but locks are secured?
Other items kept from the reach of the public: toothbrushes, batteries, hair dryers, and Mentos. Yup, the Fresh Maker. NarcoturismOne of the strangest articles I´ve read here: http://www.mexiconews.com.mx/23938.html |
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